Germany’s online Bild daily here reports on how a Chinese ice breaker trying to reach the sea ice-trapped Akademik Shokalskiy research vessel was stopped by thick sea ice: “Also The Ice Breaker Gets Stuck!”
The 74 passengers who have now been trapped 4 days in unexpected Antarctic sea ice are made up of scientists, tourists, and crew members. One passenger onboard is a journalist from the UK’s global warming alarmist daily, The Guardian. Some have criticized the expedition as a global-warming publicity junket.
Bild reports that the vessel was on a 5-week expedition to repeat the route of Antarctic scientist Douglas Mawson of 100 years earlier. Ironically, rather than finding warming and open seas, the current expedition has wound up getting trapped by thick sea ice and blizzards that have yet to be penetrated even by modern ice breakers.
Bild writes that the Akademik Shokalskiy got trapped in ice on Christmas Eve and was forced to send out distress signals. Bild adds:
A Chinese ice breaker on its way to the MV Akademik Schokalskiy” had to bail out, it was unable to continue because of the pack ice!”
According to Bild, the Akademik Shokalskiy research vessel had been only a couple of kilometers away from open water before it got stuck. Now even ice breakers cannot get within 6 miles of the vessel.
The Chinese ice breaker came as close as six and half nautical miles of the research vessel, but because of the thick ice it was unable to travel further.”
According to reports, Australian ice breaker Aurora Australis has the best chances of freeing the trapped research vessel, but that the ice breaker “will not arrive the sea ice until before Sunday.” That means the trapped passengers will have to sit tight for at least another day or two.
Frustration taking over
Originally it looked as if the Chinese ice breaker was about to reach the trapped boatpeople. Passenger and spokesman Chris Turney said that the ice breaker would arrive in “2 or 3 hours…if everything goes well”. But that turned out to be wishful thinking. The Chinese ice breaker was stopped by thick sea ice. Disappointment. Bild quotes Turney:
“The bad news is that the ice around our ship now extends out over 20 kilometers.”
Also the once festive atmosphere on the boat appears to be waning with frustration starting to creep in. Bild adds:
Even with Turney insisting that all is fine with the passengers and crew, a bit of frustration can be detected between his lines.”
The trapped boatpeople better start hoping for a little luck. Conditions down there are unpredictable and can get nasty really quickly. One bad storm could spell serious delays and lots of trouble. Moreover, expect the costs of the rescue efforts to run up into the millions.
“repeat the route of Antarctic scientist Douglas Mawson of 100 years earlier ”
Which says it all, 100 years ago there was a lot less Ice, they just don’t get it do they.
It is all about natural cycles, CO2 had nothing to do with a loss of Ice 100 years ago and now with more CO2 there is even more Ice.
I hope the Aussies give them the bill. I want to see Turney’s face when he is told to pay.
It’s a Australian University expedition. Turney is Proffessor of the Climate Change department at the University of New South Wales.
The tourists are aboard to help defray the costs.
The tourists are aboard to see the Mawson expedition site.
The psuedo akademics are there to prove AGW’s influence on the Antarctic
Unfortunately Turney is an Aussie. So we will be paying to send him down there and for the rescue too.
Oh yeah, I shouldn’t be replying on FB. (like my note about crushing the ship.)
I understand their library includes several volumes on early Antarctic exploration and they’re reading that getting stuck in ice often leads to Bad Things. At least they won’t be eaten by polar bears.
Historical crushings from a search for |arctic ships crushed sea ice|:
http://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/exploration/arctic.html
The Navy believed that warm ocean currents flowed from the Pacific Ocean into the Arctic through the Bering Strait between Alaska and Russia, maintaining ice-free waters all the way to the North Pole. However, this was not the case, and the Jeannette quickly became stuck in the sea ice shortly after passing through the Bering Strait. It drifted with the ice for two years, but in 1881, the ship was crushed by the shifting sea ice, and the crew was forced to abandon it and try to reach land over the ice. During summer, the ice broke apart before the crew reached the Russian shore, and they jumped into three small life boats they had dragged with them. One boat was lost in a storm. Of the other two, one landed near a village, and those crewmembers survived. The other unfortunate life boat landed in an isolated region, and those members did not survive, likely due to starvation.
http://nsidc.org/cryosphere/seaice/exploration/antarctic.html
Shackleton’s ship, the Endurance, sailed into the Weddell Sea in 1914 with a crew of 28 men, several dogs, and one cat–-Mrs. Chippy (who was actually a male). They encountered more sea ice than expected, and the Endurance became trapped in the ice on January 18, 1915. For several months, the ship drifted with the ice until it was finally crushed by the ice, like the Jeannette had been in the Arctic.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_voyage_of_the_Karluk
The last voyage of the Karluk, flagship of the Canadian Arctic Expedition of 1913–16, ended with the loss of the ship and the subsequent deaths of nearly half her complement. On her outward voyage in August 1913, Karluk, a brigantine formerly used as a whaler, became trapped in the Arctic ice while sailing to a rendezvous point at Herschel Island. After a long drift across the Beaufort and Chukchi seas, the ship was crushed and sunk. In the ensuing months, the crew and expedition staff struggled to survive, first on the ice and later on the shores of Wrangel Island. In all, eleven men died before help could reach them.
Thanks Ric. The possibility of the Akademik Shokalskiy getting crushed cannot be excluded should ice breakers fail to free it. That would be pretty expensive.
The irony is priceless. Yet Greenpeace continue on with Agenda 21 exhorting supporters to block every attempt to bale out the UK’s suicidal energy policy by objecting to “fracking” planning permissions in any way possible.
I am about to launch a new eBay Store name Green Eco HairShirts.
It would indeed be ironic if this ship ends up being crushed by Antarctic sea ice. A fitting metaphor for the whole global warming meme. Bet the penguins are having a chuckle.
Ice conditions on December 31, 1911 shown in the photographs. Considerably different than today. Must be climate change.
http://www.coolantarctica.com/Antarctica%20fact%20file/History/Douglas%20Mawson.htm
What an irony!
Meanwhile in Germany/Poland I’d rather see the signs of the spring. A season without snow and frost?
http://tvnmeteo.tvn24.pl/informacje-pogoda/polska,28/wisnia-zakwitla-w-szczecinie,109695,1,0.html